


If It Were Proper

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Crossdressing, F/F, Historical Inaccuracy, Love Confessions, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-17
Updated: 2017-02-17
Packaged: 2018-09-25 02:23:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9798272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: “I often find myself in want of things I find too terrible to speak aloud.”“There is nothing of the sort when it comes to me and you.” I assure her. “Please, tell me your troubles.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> Not britpick-ed or beta-ed, extremely minimal historical research. I wrote this semi in the style of ACD, but I am not familiar enough with the original work to pretend this is not an extremely convoluted BBC Sherlock AU. Both Holmes and Watson are women who dress as men in order to do their jobs in Victorian London.

I watch Holmes stretch and sigh loudly as she drops the restricting fabric from her torso. I have a fair bit of sympathy for her, the city rarely gives her enough time to rest, not like she should. Now, with the curtains drawn and only one lone candle burning near her bedroom she is finally able to rid herself of the rich façade we must present to the public.

If it were proper, I would tell her she is beautiful.

She is lit only from one side, making her look soft and pale as moonlight in the darkness, something so lovely and delicate like a painting of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood’s. Oh how I long to touch that alabaster dream, to hold her delicate bones in my hands, to do things most improper. If only it were possible.

I believe living as a man by daylight has left me in a rather confusing state, my emotions and physical desires often swirl together down a dark path that leads only ever to Holmes. If she were truly the man she had to pretend to be maybe…but then again, no. It is not any put upon masculinity that reaches in to my deepest of hearts, to pull upon the strings and push Cupid’s bow inch by agonizing inch upon my breast. It is instead the altogether lovely and intoxicating air I breathe in anytime I am near to my friend.

It is only the stark reality that I adore of her.

When she is charming as she is cruel, soft as she is unyielding, fragile as she is indestructible. The parts of her I would not share with the public even if it were a different time or place where they could be acceptable. The parts of her that are wholly mine to behold.

If it were proper, I would tell her she is perfect for me.

Today’s case had been particularly straining, both on the physical and emotional state of my dear Holmes, though she would never admit it and I would never write it.

It is hard on the heart when the victim is a woman, there is rarely the appropriate amount of outrage. It is also heard on the heart when the killer is a woman, there is rarely an appropriate amount of scorn. Although in that case it is often more rather than less.

It is times like these that I, and I believe Holmes as well, have a hard time keeping up with the motions, to keep a cool detachment from the involved parties on basis of gender alone. Add in a chase across London which left Holmes’ chest heaving beneath its confines and she must be ready to rest for a few days at least.

Which is why I paused before her door, on my way to the staircase that would lead me to my own. There, still in the dim candlelight, Holmes was not preparing for bed. Instead she sat, still in her unbuttoned undervest and trousers, head in hands, and looking altogether a fright to me. This is not the Holmes I know, this was a woman terrified and melancholic.

“Holmes.” I spoke to her, wanting to share her troubles if she so allowed. “What is troubling you so?”

She lifts her head enough for me to see the soft color in her eyes.

“Those women today…they were lovers.” She tells me, surprising me as always. “I of course could not tell the officers this, it would have done nothing but further diminish their sympathy of Miss White, but still I am thinking of them. How hard must it be, to never speak your love aloud, how terrible the pain that you would end your beloved’s life to spare them of it.”

“Holmes…” I say, somewhat at a loss. “I am sorry, this world is-”

She, thankfully, interrupts.

 “I often find myself in want of things I find too terrible to speak aloud.”

“There is nothing of the sort when it comes to me and you.” I assure her. “Please, tell me your troubles.”

She lifts her head fully, looking away from where I have entered her room.

“I’m afraid I cannot. Were this a different world, or perhaps a different time…But still, it does not do well to dwell on things that cannot be.”

“My dear Holmes, you remind me day after day that things I once thought impossible can be, don’t tell me you have met your match.”

That makes her laugh, one short huff of breath, but I can appreciate it for what it is.

“A love too forbidden to speak, to terrible to feel, an ache you would kill someone over if it meant you would spare them of it. All this I have felt, Watson. All of this for you, every fingertip bruised under a sorrowful composition, every time I have held back a cutting remark to save your reputation, every brilliant deduction I have made in your presence, all of it only for your approval, your respect.” She shakes her head. “Another way I could say this…I have always found the prospect of being someone’s wife abhorrent in every possible way, but you Watson…You make me want to be your wife.”

She whispers the sentiment, as if it really could cause her physical harm to speak too loudly those words.

“In a different world…perhaps a different time…” I repeat her earlier sentiment, feeling the longing claw its way up my internal organs and wanting nothing more for it to be that time and place. “Perhaps then you could.”

A breath.

“I certainly wouldn’t object to this.” I tell her, some truth finally. “I couldn’t object, for I feel the same, Holmes. The bruises on your fingertips match the ones I force onto my own body in punishment for the things I feel. The bleeding of your tongue when you hold yourself back matches the bleeding of my own whenever I look at you and cannot tell you the truth.”

She turns around to face me and I can see the tears on her lovely cheekbones, her eyes rimmed in pink.

“Can we pretend?” She pleads with me. “Can we pretend that we are in that different world…that different time. Just for tonight?”

She is so tender when she says this that I know I could never deny her. I also know, as we slip into bed together, that it could never just be one night.

I think she knows this too.


End file.
